COMING SOON: SEEK

New media artist Nancy Baker Cahill is no stranger to NoPro’s audience, whether we’re talking about her virtual reality works, her takeover of Time Square, or the augmented reality 4th Wall App.

Now she’s poised to launch what might easily be her most ambitious work yet, the 30-minute SEEK, as part of Cosm Studios’ initial lineup of original immersive works:

SEEK invites you to actively look and listen more deeply, dissolving the interface between viewer, lens, and filmed content. It features a series of bespoke abstract landscapes — water, sand and wind, fire, and forest — each layered with meticulously camouflaged imagery and sound. You’ll be asked to “seek” in both the literal and philosophical sense: to discern, grapple with, and imagine interconnected and entangled worlds.

We got the lowdown from director Nancy Baker Cahill about the new show currently scheduled to run July 29th to August 22nd at Cosm’s flagship venue in Inglewood, CA.

This is No Proscenium’s COMING SOON, a look at ongoing immersive experiences & events. To learn more about how your event could be considered for the feature check out How To Get Covered By NoPro.

NO PROSCENIUM: Tell us a little bit about your experience! What’s it about? What makes it immersive?

Nancy Baker Cahill: SEEK is an expanded film that deploys layering and camouflage to invite audiences to interactively “seek” in both the literal and philosophical sense through quantum listening and perceiving. SEEK is intended to challenge sensory perception and imagination to prompt deeper engagement with the earth’s imperiled biosphere. Viewers embark on an odyssey through four elemental environments; Water, Sand/Wind, Fire and Forest. SEEK asks what might be hidden in plain sight, and what might an unconstrained human imagination discover in the gaps. By focusing on our collective interdependence on and in fragile ecosystems, SEEK prompts considerations of how we might develop new forms of cognition to move through the world more attentively. Filmic collage provides a layered, multi-spatial — almost quantum interface through which one can actively and sensorily explore themes of discovery, integration/distinction, simultaneity, and revelation. The Cosm canvas makes it unbelievably immersive — both the high-res LED CX Display and the incredibly complex, multi-channel surround sound system. Both enable a VR-esque experience without a headset. Of course, we also hope viewers will experience awe and wonder at scale.

NP: What was the inspiration for your upcoming experience?

NBC: The human-caused climate crisis is at the heart of SEEK and undergirds its inspiration which is to invite deeper sensory engagement and ecological consciousness.

Many ideas and sources inspired SEEK; not limited to but including the reading list in the last question below. I’ll include three key quotes:

“Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world.” — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

“The logic of camouflage is the translation of ‘a seeing into the world’… this ‘seeing’ is activated precisely by the rendering invisible of the self.” — Hanna Rose Shell, Hide and Seek

“I believe that humans are traumatized by having severed their connections with nonhuman beings, connections that exist deep inside their bodies (in our DNA, for instance; fingers aren’t exclusively human, nor are lungs or cell metabolism). We sever these connections in social and philosophical space, but they still exist.” — Timothy Morton, Being Ecological

Get NoPro Newswire’s stories in your inbox

Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.

SubscribeSubscribe

Part of what also inspired the work is the current technologically mediated condition of not being encouraged to rely on our own embodied, sensory intelligence (or “embrainment”) as we encounter the world around us. By dissolving the screen interface, SEEK shifts the self-centered lens outward, inviting viewers to “disappear” together into a chameleonic shared reality, and underscoring our collective interdependence.

NP: What do you think fans of immersive will find most interesting about this latest experience?

NBC: I hope they are inspired by how active and layered an experience it is — the sound and imagery invite close attention and sensorial engagement. I also hope it moves them emotionally.

NP: Once you started designing and testing what did you discover about this experience that was unexpected?

NBC: How unbelievably challenging it is to create a multi-layered, 30-minute film from scratch using VFX in 12K+ for a bespoke dome. I am so lucky to have a production team of absolute pros — all of whom have worked in VR or 3D. I also chose two very difficult things to simulate — water and fire. Add layering and embedding other visuals and it was an arduous (although it has to be said- incredibly rewarding!) path. The comping alone was a 24/7 job. Our sound team also layered some shots with tremendous complexity — one shot alone had something like 50 tracks.

NP: What can fans who are coming to this, or thinking about coming to this, do to get into the mood of the experience?

NBC:

• Hide and Seek by Hanna Rose Shell
• Being Ecological by Timothy Morton
• Quantum Listening by Pauline Oliveros
• Ways of Being by James Bridle
• Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
• Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake
• Films by Len Lye

Discover the latest immersive events, festivals, workshops, and more at our new site EVERYTHING IMMERSIVE, home of NoPro’s show listings.

NoPro is a labor of love made possible by our generous Patreon backers. Join them today and get access to our Newsletter and Discord!

In addition to the No Proscenium website and our podcast, and you can find NoPro on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, and in the Facebook community also named Everything Immersive.